The Worst, Best Place to Be in the Bible

The Wilderness E1 — This year, we are looking at themes that play a prominent role in the Exodus story. And today, we’re starting a new series on the theme of the wilderness. The wilderness is a setting that shows up constantly in the Bible, and it mainly represents a hostile, barren place where humans can’t survive. So why does God repeatedly lead his people through it? In this episode, Jon and Tim introduce the theme and discuss how the biblical authors portray the wilderness as a place of testing, character formation, and even an Eden-like refuge.

CHAPTERS

1. The Breadth and Meaning of the Wilderness in the Bible (0:00-12:30)
2. A Place Hostile for Human Life (12:30-30:35)
3. A Place of Testing and Refuge (30:35-47:09)

OFFICIAL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

View this episode’s official transcript.

REFERENCED RESOURCES

• Tim alludes to this past episode about the function of settings in the Bible: Setting in Biblical Narrative from our How to Read the Bible series.
• Check out Tim’s extensive collection of recommended books here.
• You can view annotations for this episode—plus our entire library of videos, podcasts, articles, and classes—in the BibleProject app, available for Android and iOS.

SHOW MUSIC

• “Pearly Gates ft. Isaac Wheadon” by Lofi Sunday
• “Sunrise ft. Jk Beatbook” by Lofi Sunday
• BibleProject theme song by TENTS

SHOW CREDITS

Production of today’s episode is by Lindsey Ponder, producer, and Cooper Peltz, managing producer. Tyler Bailey is our supervising engineer, who also edited today’s episode and provided the sound design and mix. JB Witty does our show notes, and Hannah Woo provides the annotations for our app. Our host and creative director is Jon Collins, and our lead scholar is Tim Mackie. 

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